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A Night Of Hope, Inspiration and A Call To Action

Hi New Hope friend,

Jamey McDonald here. Today I want to tell you about what an awesome banquet experience on November 6 at the Bombay Banquet Centre in Surrey. We called it "Telling New Hope Stories", and had an amazing evening with good food, fun friends around tables, great stories from our past and present residents, and a challenging appeal from myself to seek some help to keep the New Hope story going.

There are over 21 Million Refugees World Wide.

The United Nations has said that there are now over 21 million refugees world wide... and why that number is increasing is due to conflict and turmoil in many areas of the world. At our banquet, we put faces to the crisis and listened to the stories of current and past residents of New Hope

Throughout the night we heard some heartbreaking, inspiring and hopeful stories from our current and graduated residents from New Hope. I will refer to all residents by their initial to keep their privacy.

We heard a story from K. who came from Swaziland 10 years ago. K. arrived at New Hope with nothing more than a suitcase, and is now studying to be a nurse.

H. told a harrowing story of being confronted at gunpoint in his middle eastern city because, as a television reporter, he had named names, shown photos, detailed activities of terrorist activities in his country. He, his wife and their 4-year-old daughter were threatened. It was then that he knew that he had "get out of Dodge", and came to Canada to restart his life in 2016 with New Hope.

R.'s story surrounds her coming to Canada with her husband and 4 children after 7 years of living in a refugee camp in Kenya. They arrived to New Hope in the summer of 2016. This past spring she and her husband suffered a miscarriage. it was the women who live in the residential community called New Hope that provided her support and care in her loss. No one spoke her language, but hugs don't need vocabulary to be understood. In the summer of 2017 he secured employment and stabilized income, allowing them to start their own life in a 3 bedroom apartment. A success story!

S.'s story of losing his home to bombing in Syria, and being forced to flee to Lebanon next door. He and his family of 6 lived in a 4-metre x 4-metre room for two years. He had odd jobs as a carpenter to help support his family. Then, in July 2017 he was given the opportunity to come to Canada--a land that, in his mind, was far away. All S. wanted to do was go back to Syria and resume his career as a farmer growing crops. Ultimately his friends fin convinced him Canada was a good place, and he has arrived with his family to New Hope since August.

Your Impact

We pre-sold 144 seats at the banquet, and had 136 people show up - a 95% turnout rate! (Next year we're aiming for 200!). We asked for help and received just over $41,000 from people that evening and the week afterwards.

It's always such a blessing to see so many involved and passionate people within the community. I was blown away with the generosity of everyone who came. We are so grateful and humbled by your donations. Personal thank you cards for donors are coming this week.

We are ALWAYS 100% full at New Hope. In fact, whenever a client graduates, there are usually 6-10 applications from deserving individuals & families for the space. As of now, we have 13 units, and are eagerly looking to expand in order to provide the service of New Hope to deserving people by adding a second building in 2018. In order to reach our goal and provide meaningful lives in Canada to more refugees, we need to raise an additional $35,000 by the end of the year.This will help us "break even" which is the perfect sweet spot for a not-for-profit. Any monies above that amount will be put towards expansion. If you want to give directly to expansion, feel free to do so.

Do you want to give the gift of a new life to those torn from their homes? If you weren't able to attend the banquet or provide a donation, but still want to give to the cause, please click here to donate.

Special thanks to Rose Woller (staff) and Shaley Hoogendoorn (Messy Beauty With Shaley -- Event Planning) for their behind the scenes tireless work. Great job.

And thank you if you were part of the evening. We had an amazing time and you helped to make it happen. If you didn't get a chance to come out, we'll do another banquet / gala event next fall. Before then, keep in mind we'll do a volunteer's appreciation night in late March/April. Dates are TBA - stay tuned!

Many of our families have now been with us for close to six months. In this time, they have settled in, the kids are in school, the parents are learning English—life has developed a routine. This is when we start to talk about finding work.

We recently met with a job placement expert who told us it’s a six-month process to get people into the job market (including resume building, skills clarification, and language acquisition). When I heard that, my heart sank—six months is a long stretch.

One of our residents is a Syrian father who has been desperately wanting work. After the meeting, one of our volunteers walked with him to a nearby autobody shop. Within 15 minutes, he was hired to wash and wax cars, vacuum interiors and trunks, and polish chrome. The owner of the shop was an immigrant himself who had moved to Canada from Eastern Europe 25 years ago. When asked about our friend's struggles with English, the owner replied in a thick accent, "You think mine is any good? He'll learn on the job just like I did!"

Achmad is thrilled to have found work. His wife and children are so proud of him. Sometimes all it takes to succeed is to have someone believe in you. I wanted to share this story with you so you can see how your support of New Hope helps refugees like Achmad. If you're able, please consider making a gift to New Hope this Christmas, and help us continue to make a difference in people's lives.

It was during the month of Ramadan—when our Muslim residents are fasting during the day and refraining from most external activity—that one of the families invited me to drink tea with them. As we sat and talked about life, the wife asked in broken English if she could tell me her story.

As I listened, she shared with me that two years ago, in her home country, she had watched a video and it had turned her heart toward Jesus. I affirmed her with a gentle smile and looked inquisitively towards her husband. He threw his hands up and said, “Not me! I'm still Muslim."

We talked about what had happened in their home country. He is a moderate man, well educated, and accustomed to living with the tension between modern ways and traditional cultural practices. As such, he was supportive of his wife’s decision. His family, on the other hand, was not. At first, they pressured him to ‘get her in line.’ When he defended her choice, they warned him in a threatening tone that his child would ‘grow up crooked.’ Being a man of action, he made the difficult decision to leave his homeland to spare his family from religious persecution. And so, they came to Canada where they could have a fresh start at life.

They’re now living with us in Surrey, where they’re rebuilding their life in a one-bedroom apartment. Learning English is paramount to the husband as he knows what it takes to get ahead in Canada. I have confidence he'll do it. I have a hunch that in six to nine months, his family will no longer be living with us because they will have graduated and gotten on with the process of rebuilding their life.

We are nowhere near the end of the story on this one. But here's another dimension. A couple of weeks ago, I spoke in a nearby church. Guess who was sitting in the second row because they had been invited to church? You guessed it.

New Skills

Presently, we are working on helping our residents with their English language acquisition. Some of them know some English upon arrival, so it's really about fine-tuning their skills. Because they have a good start on the language, I imagine that job acquisition is in their near future. Other residents aren't in the same place. One family has been living in a Kenyan refugee camp for the past seven years and they have had very little external help. None of their children have been attending school. I think their greatest obstacle is fear—fear of making a mistake, fear of being judged—so in their mind, it's better to say nothing. Our approach is very non-judgmental. In addition to formal ESL classes during the day, we do three tutorials a week with volunteer help. We also do a homework club twice a week with the children who are in school (and growing like weeds).

New Families

I mentioned that one of our families graduated in late August. They moved to be closer to their employment. Another family left on September 30th. Their family of seven (mom, dad, and five kids) had struggled in a two-bedroom apartment, and they felt ready to move out on their own. With the help of their support team, they were able to find a three-bedroom place to put down roots. As a result, we have two new families coming before the end of October.

If your group needs housing for a refugee family, we may have room. It never hurts to call!

Christmas is coming and with it comes year end. We find ourselves thanking God that we have received close to 75% of our needs already. We need to push forward to finish the year end well so we can continue to help families in need. If you are able to give a gift to our year end campaign, we would be delighted. One gracious donor has provided a gift of up to $25,000 promising to match any and all year end donations—this gives you a chance to double your gift! It's easiest to donate by going to our website atwww.newhopecs.org, or if you wish to mail a cheque, please send it to:

This summer has been one of incredible beginnings for the team at New Hope and for those who, quite quickly, begin to feel more like family than simply newcomers to Canada. Moving from paralysis to productivity means that new beginnings become a regular occurrence, as life in a new country brings with it changes both commonplace and unexpected. Here are a number of those new beginnings that have happened over the summer, and continue to happen as we work together each day at New Hope.

New schools to play at

Every morning there is a bustle of excitement as over a dozen children rush out the door to their new school. We have 15 children under twelve years of age at New Hope, all registered in a nearby Surrey public school. The school has done an amazing job receiving them and figuring out how best to place them in the right class for sake of learning. Just like Canadian children, sometimes not every child seems excited to head out the door in the morning, but by 3:00 in the afternoon there is a huge sense of energy as they arrive home with smiles from their day of learning and play. Are they happy because they went to school? Or is because they have finished school for the day?

New languages to learn

We are in a big push to help with english language acquisition right now. All children are in school and doing famously while most parents attend ESL classes. Each day we do a "homework club" with the kids where they get help with their school work and practice english. Three times a week a number of mothers in the building also meet for english learning (as women). We are starting to do some one-on-one tutoring with adults in the privacy of their apartments as learning is hard for some, and potentially more embarrassing than satisfying, as they face the challenge of a new language. We flex in order for them to succeed.

New stories to be shared

One of our newest residents was a reporter in his homeland and had the misfortune of producing news that was unflattering to a particular group in his country. The group visited his home and threatened he and his family, so he knew that it was time to flee to safety, arriving in Canada in March. Today, he's improving his english and also picking up "barbering/hair cutting" skills because he figures he can make a living with it (media work is out of the question due to language issues). He's just finishing his training course and has offered hair cuts to everyone in the building!

And of course, new goodbyes

It's amazing to think it is already happening, but our first family left us at the end of August as they had tuned up their english skills, found jobs, and realized that they needed to live closer to their employment. They had only been with us 6 months but they were ready to go so we prayed with them, hugged them, helped them with luggage and tearfully sent them on their way. Like any graduation, it was a time of mixed emotions.

But also, new hello's

Finally, a new family came last week to take the spot recently vacated by our first graduates. They came to us from Iran and are supported by the Cariboo Road Christian Fellowship in Burnaby. The church team provided start up furniture, food, and beddings and have identified a team of 6-10 individuals who will give 6-10 hours per week to help this new family settle into Canada. We are very excited to support them as they begin their journey of new beginnings as well.

As we continue seeing many new beginnings we encourage you to send us a message, come for a visit, or get together with your friends and family to share with them the exciting things happening at New Hope this year.

When I am talking with friends and they share a situation, I sometimes ask them a question. I say--"if you were successful in this challenge, what would that success look like?" Usually they share a great expectation of how things could work. I am always amazed. Success is a beautiful thing.

When my friend Nafisa came to Canada, the question was there. What will success look like? She arrived from Bangladesh needing a home, just a quiet, safe place. New Hope was able to provide that. Initially all our residents just need safety. For a month or two or even three, their primary need is to settle in to Canada and find stability. It means not worrying about theft of invaders. It means being able to walk down the street without fear of attack. After successfully negotiating quietness, the next challenge was english acquisition. She successfully negotiated that. The next challenge was job acquisition. She managed that. And today, she's doing an amazing job as a head chef at Langara College in Vancouver.

Since March of 2016 New Hope has welcomed 10 families into our residence in Surrey. Presently 3 Syrian families, 2 Iraqi families, 1 family from Ethiopia, 1 from Eritrea, 1 from the Congo, 1 from Honduras, and 1 from Pakistan all make up the New Hope Community residence. We have a total of 55 people living together finding their way in the early days into Canada.

What does success look like for us at New Hope? We like to say it happens when people move from "paralysis to productivity". Our goal is to have our residents, settled, learning english, acquiring job skills, finding confidence...and ultimately employed and contributing to the society of Canada. We think it can happen in the first 12-16 months after arrival. And when they are successful, they are encouraged to move on, establishing their own personal home. They graduate! And when they leave us to establish their own independent lives, it opens up the apartment they lived in to the next refugees family. And we start the process all over again.

Success is a target and you have to identify the target is you want to hit it.